I think we first realized what a little spitfire we had on our hands when she brought us her treat bowl. She being our dog Hershey. And the treat bowl, meaning she was smart enough to know the treat bowl and food bowl were two different things. She’d pick it up and bring it to you, set it down right in front of your feet and look at you as if to say “Well?”

We’d bought a dog naming book and finally resorted to the Internet to find the best name for her. Hershey. Because her little brown nose looked like a Hershey’s kiss.

When we first got her, she wanted exercise so we’d toss a tennis ball over the stairs in our upstairs duplex apartment and she’d run down the stairs to get it, only to drop it in your lap 30 seconds later, ready to go again.

Every stuffed animal we ever gave her had the squeaker annihilated about 10 minutes after we gave it to her. Every little white puff of stuffing inside, pulled out with only the lifeless outer shell in a crumpled heap.  Silly girl.

Every single couch we owned had the right back cushion mashed down at the top where all 18 lbs of her laid everyday while we were at work. She knew she wasn’t “allowed” on the couch. Silly girl.

Maybe it was the memory I have of her bounding through the snow like a little beige snow bunny in her blue sweater and little dog boots. (She LOVED cold weather, oh and btw, Gary thought those
boots were ridiculous.) Or the time they’d put salt on the ground and I’d heard salt in between pads was bad, so I put her feet into little ziploc bags and then zipped them as closed as possible, THEN put the boots on. Not sure who was sillier in that instance, her or me.

I have a picture of her in that big snow drift. And one of me holding her in my wedding dress.

She loved car rides and wiped her little brown Hershey kiss nose all over the widndows, this coining the household term “smudgy nose prints”.

She had this one spot in Beetle Juice where Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin dressed up as ghosts and started boo’ing.   You know, “booooooooooo”ing.  Hershey would stick her nose up in the air and howl. She would never howl ever, unless that movie was on, and in that exact spot. 

She moved with us from our apartment in Belleville (that allowed no pets, btw) to Gary’s dad’s for a year to Alabama while we saved for a house. And she jad her “spots”. She slept at the foot of the bed, on my side with Buckley. Then when we bought our house, she had this one spot in the yard where she loved to just plop down and lay in the dirt in the ravine. (Of course, I have a picture.) Over the years it was harder for her to jump up on the bed, so she slept underneath. When we moved to an apartment in Madison, she would lay right under the recliner so you could never close the recliner when you got up, you had to roll out of it to check for little beige blob underneath. She couldn’t hop up on the couch anymore, so she would nap nestled right up against the couch base and your feet, alternating every nap between Gary’s couch and mine.

In our current house, when we started homeschooling she would come lay down on the tile, under the table, because wherever her family was, that’s where she wanted to be.

She preferred her water straight out of the bathtub, drinking out of your cupped hands instead of filtered through the fridge in her water dish.

If you were cooking, she was there, waiting for scraps to fall.

If you held your hand too far down with whatever you were eating, she would snatch it. That crazy girl was a sucker for anything wrapped in a wrapper, and loved french fries and popcorn. 

About the past 6 months or so, anything Hershey wanted, we gave her. Pepperoni from our pizza. Sleeping on the bed. We forgave any accidents she might have because she forgot where she was and how to ask to go outside. We grumbled, but she never got scolded. We just knew she forgot. Because that’s the good girl she was, never spiteful, so smart and loving.

When she died two weeks before Christmas, our entire family was heartbroken. I held the kids together while we buried her on Sunday morning. We found her the perfect spot in the yard, overlooking the lake, and the kids picked out the perfect rock as her headstone. The days afterward were sad, and I couldn’t help but think of the void she left in our family.  

You see, she didn’t just grow up with us. 

We were still babies ourselves, not even newlyweds when she came to us. Every milestone we had had as a family, she was there. Through tragedies, other heartbreaks, births, and joys. In every picture we have of her, I can remember exactly where we were, as a family. 

But then I think of the past few months and realize that when she was quickly deteriorating, I was taking on more, and more that drew me away from the very people I was working so hard for. I spent the last two days of her life holding her for nearly 48 hours, realizing how very precious the gift of time is. I am so thankful for those two days, and what she taught me without ever saying a word.

You see, no matter how much money we bring in, or for what cause we are working our butts off, all of us are allotted only so much time. Spending it with others is the very best gift we can give. Dropping absolutely everything for those two days to hold my sweet girl was worth every minute.

2014 will bring lots of changes. More me time. More family time. Maybe a job or two less. When you see some drastic move I’m making, don’t freak out. It’s been well-prayed-for in advance. I can see that sweet girl’s spot every time I look into the back yard. But to feel the footprints she left I need only glance at my heart.

XOXO,

Karen